prideful hospitality...

is from what i suffer. does anyone else ever struggle with what their true motive is behind their hospitality? yes, my desire is definitely fellowship with others, getting to know other people, catching up with friends, serving, sharing the gospel through opening up our home, etc. however, there is also a motive of my prideful heart...whether it be to show off my home, good cooking skills, cute kids, etc. or the latter, which is most of the time for me...fear of what other people might think of me when my house is not clean enough, big enough, beautifully decorated, or my cooking is just sub par, or when my kids are misbehaving. more often than not, these thoughts seem to fill my head when preparing for someone coming over. fortunatley once people are here, i tend to forget my worries and truly enjoy the fellowship, unless the boys really are going nuts. however, i still desire the compliments..."i just love your house," or "the food was delicious," or "your kids are just the cutest and best behaved kids ever!"

last night after i wrote that post about our crazy weekend, i got in bed and read june 3rd's evening devotion from Spurgeon's Morning and Evening daily readings. i was convicted again of my pride!! coincidence? i think not! read for yourself...

"He humbled himself" (Philippians 2:8)
Jesus is the great teacher of lowliness of heart. We need daily to learn of Him. See the Master taking a towel and washing His disciples' feet! Follower of Christ, wilt thou humble thyself? See Him as the Servant of servants, and surely thou canst not be proud! Is not this sentence the compendium of His biography, 'He humbled Himself'? Was He not on earth always stripping off first one robe of honour and then another, till, naked, He was fastened to the cross, and there did He not empty out His inmost self, pouring out His lifeblood, giving up for all of us, till they laid Him penniless in a borrowed grave? How low was our dear Redeemer brought! How then can we be proud? Stand at the foot of the cross, and count the purple drops by which you have been cleansed; see the thorn-crown; mark His scourged shoulders, still gushing with encrimsoned rills; see hands and feet given up to the rough iron, and His whole self to mockery and scorn; see the bitterness, and the pangs, and the throes of inward grief, showing themselves in His outward frame; hear the thrilling shriek, 'My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?'. And if you do not lie prostrate on the ground before that cross, you have never seen it: if you are not humbled in the presence of Jesus, you do not know Him. You were so lost that nothing could save you but the sacrifice of God's only begotten. Think of that, and as Jesus stooped for you, bow yourself in lowliness at His feet. A sense of Christ's amazing love to us has a greater tendency to humble us than even a consciousness of our own guilt. May the Lord bring us in contemplation to Calvary, then our position will no longer be that of the pompous man of pride, but we shall take the humble place of one who loves much because much has been forgiven him. Pride cannot live beneath the cross. Let us sit there and learn our lesson, and then rise and carry it into practice.